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Having said that, how certain exercises are performed will be determined by the structure of your pelvis and how loose or tight your ligaments are. And often these factors are influenced by your gender.

For instance, the pelvis shape that is most common in women tends to result in an over-arch in the lower back, says health scientist and personal trainer Claire Norgate.

This is a posture known as lumbar lordosis, where your pelvis is tilted too far forward. It's a very common condition in women — and it can cause pain through increased pressure on your spine.

Many strength-training exercises can accentuate lordosis. But you don't have to avoid them. You just need to ensure you're doing them with the correct posture (try to position your hips so they are in the same line as your rib cage).

If an over-arched back is a problem for you, prioritise strengthening your hamstrings, do plenty of hip extension exercises and build a strong core. These exercises will help tilt your pelvis back into a more neutral position.

Flexible joints

"Your pelvis shape, plus how much control you have over your ligaments, will determine your range of movement when exercising," Ms Norgate says.

For example, if you're very flexible (hypermobile), it means the ligaments surrounding your joints are loose, putting the joints at risk of damage.

"That means you might have to decrease how far you go into certain exercises, to protect your hips, shoulders and knees."

While lordosis and hypermobile joints are far more common in women, it's important to know that men can experience them too.

And ladies, oestrogen acts like an anti-inflammatory, so you might not feel injuries as quickly as you should. If you do feel aches and pains from exercise, don't ignore them.

Core strength isn't just for girls

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Now that women aren't afraid of the barbell, blokes could benefit from stepping into a few classes that are usually the domain of ladies, such as Pilates.

As well as strengthening the "core" (the muscles supporting your torso), Pilates improves posture and coordination, and also develops often-neglected muscle groups, including one many men never think about — the sling of muscles at the base of the pelvis, known as the pelvic floor.

A strong pelvic floor is linked with, among other things, better orgasms and sexual function — yes, even in men.

There's evidence it can improve erectile dysfunction, which affects one in five men over 40, according to Andrology Australia.

Many women worry that weight training will leave them resembling a female Arnold Schwarzenegger. So they either avoid it altogether, or stick with dumbbells so light they barely break a sweat.

"That's borne out of a misunderstanding of muscle physiology, where the belief is that if you lift heavy weights you'll bulk up, and if you lift lighter weights for more repetitions you won't," explains sports scientist Tony Boutagy.

"That has well and truly been proven wrong.

"Females can gain muscle just as easily as men — muscle that's exhausted at any repetition range will get bigger, no matter what gender you are."

And to be brutally honest, if you're not working your muscles to exhaustion, you're not getting maximum value from a strength training workout.

Women's lower testosterone levels will limit the muscle bulk they will gain.

Dr Boutagy also points out women rarely train as much as men to lay down enough muscle tissue.

"Plus, they aren't consuming enough calories and don't eat the large amount of quality protein throughout the day to build muscle that size," he says.

"Lifting heavy weights will not make women look like masculine female body-builders who train every day and take steroids."

The "bulking-up" that actually happens to most women is when they build muscle, but don't lose the body fat surrounding it.

Everyone wants to be "toned", but what most people don't realise is that tone is actually muscle that's only covered with a modest amount of fat.

Strength battle of the sexes

Seeing as there aren't significant differences between the two sexes when it comes to training, does that mean women can get as strong and fast as the blokes?

Unfortunately no, according to Dr Boutagy.

"Everything that makes a good endurance athlete, such as VO2 max [the ability for your heart, muscles and lungs to use oxygen during exercise] and lactate threshold [how long you can exercise at high intensity], is more pronounced in males than females," he says.